Flor
by LonesomePenguin
Summary: Luna is sick, with nobody to save her, and no cure to aide her. Wakatoshi is perfect. Wing spiker for Japan's national team and seemingly happy. Seemingly. What happens when you mix the two—black and white—what will happen, then? An explosion. An explosion of confusion, agony, joy, and most of all love. Love is the one thing that will prevail and, like a star, guide them.
1. Prólogo

**Cero**

 **They called it** a disease because it fit the description.

 _Harmful. Dreadful. Awful. Painful. Terrible._ Those were a number of synonyms to describe it; yet, it never did match one word entirely as it poured over my being, over and over again until there was nothing.

That's what I was—nothing.

I basked within my thoughts, thoughts full of aimless theories and dreams that had no destination or significance.

 _"Snap out of it! We're taking you to the clinic this instant!"_ They believed that a doctor alone could cure my sickness. But this was not a sickness, this was an abomination. A war within oneself, a war between spirit and complacency.

 _"We've all gone through this, Luna-san. You'll see, you'll prevail, just like we did."_ Religion was neither an escape nor a cure. It was a vacuum, a vacuum built by the cunning hands of corruption that sucked in all of the benevolence and hope that fools mindlessly provided.

 _"You'll see."_ My sight was gone at this point, obliterated and mauled by the insecurities of my thoughts as my head spun in an effort to regain any form of semblance from disaster.

 _I'm worthless._ I wasn't blind to my reputation.

I knew of it and I embraced it, only leaving the security of my ragged apartment once in a blue moon to see the lights. Sendai's lights.

 _There lays a miracle within those lights, you must have faith._ "Excuse me." A simple sentence it was at the time, but as I turned and met his eyes; we both knew it wasn't simple, and we both knew that this—our encounter—was no mere coincidence.

 _Fate is either a win or a loss. It's a game, after all_. It was fate—and fate had no restricting dogmas or customs. Fate was fate, as free as the name sounded, and as he grabbed onto my shoulder for leverage; I smiled.

It had been three years since I had smiled. 

**Ok so I know I published this a while ago, but here it is. The copy that will stay here permanently. If you're wondering why I unpublished just message me. It's a mess, lol. Anyway, thank you all for reading even if it is just the prologue; I appreciate it. Please look forward for the following chapters that will come along (I have nine so far). Thank you all and I hope you enjoyed!**


	2. Uno

_**Uno**_

Everything stilled for a millisecond, the murmurs around us, the clanking of porcelain and the wailing of tea kettle; it all stilled.

The knitted scarf around my neck was suffocating. No, everything felt suffocating as the man before me—my blind date—opened his mouth to utter out something, something that could either mend or break this dwindling situation.

"I haven't come to Miyagi in years. It's been awhile since I've breathed in the calmness of the forest and the trees. I miss it; I truly do." His tone was an oxymoron; tender and curt, like the gaze that reflected over his olive eyes.

Parched could have described my mouth as I parted my lips.

I hadn't spoken in what felt like months, but had truly been minutes. His stern gaze stealing the words that danced over the tip of my tongue and the seam of my cherry lips.

"You're not missing much. Sure, the trees are nice to see and breath in, but that's the only thing they're worth for. Elsewhere sounds better than here in any circumstance." The waitress swiveled by our table, pouring tea into my cup as a dust of scarlet evaded her  
pearly skin.

She liked him, my blind date, and she couldn't make it any more obvious as she pressed her breasts together with her elbows while she poured the boiling substance, her growing cleavage fruitless as he paid no avail to her pity attempts.

"But it's not like I can get out of here. My father owns a grocery store downtown that I can't possibly leave to pursue my own bitter dreams. Well, if there's one thing I like about this place is the scenery. It's plenty of food for thought." _CLANK!_ By accident, my spoon dropped to the floor, the provocative waitress bending down in such a lewd manner in front of my date that it was obscene to my round and mature eyes.

A sour smile curved the corner of my rosy lips, my date nodding as he grabbed the spoon for her with an impassive look to his bleak, brown eyes.

"Thank you!" The waitress straightened out the ruffles in her black skirt, chagrin invading  
her composure as she sauntered back to the kitchen.

"Perhaps I am biased because I grew up around here." I hummed and crossed my legs. He wasn't cheerful with his words, and I seemed to prefer that over saccharine words. The intention was what mattered, and he made a point out of it. "Also, my name is Ushijima Wakatoshi." His name was as refined as his stature, my hand reaching his as I shook his hand in affirmation.

"Chiba Luna," I said. "I would prefer if you called me Luna, though. Mostly everyone calls me that." He nodded, placing a few packets of sugar across the table, on my  
side.

"So, Ushijima, what do you do?" A spark of something foreign danced over Ushijima's eyes, animation instilling itself in his limbs as he straightened his posture out, his emotional borders slowly loosening beneath my gaze.

"I'm a professional volleyball player," he explained, never failing to regain my attention. "I've been playing since I was seven, when my father taught me." He radiated confidence and I couldn't tell if that was either a good or a bad thing.

"That's good to hear." I ripped open the sugar packets, sprinkling my tea with sugar then stirring it together. "I used to play volleyball back in high school." Ushijima practically lunged forward, his forehead a few inches away from mine as interest finally leaked in his ever so blank face.

"Why did you quit? Also, what was your position?" I brought my cup of tea to my lips, blowing a soft breeze over the scalding liquid as it scorched the tip of my tongue.

"Reality caught up and I realized that my club activities were only temporary." I lied, discarding my lies on a bed of nondescript stories that my mind tirelessly made up in an effort to shield the volatile shards of my past that lay in the heart of it all. "I was a liberó." He nodded; drinking from his glass of water as his gaze uncomfortably roamed my figure.

"I predicted that. Your stature is short, tiny even." Ushijima's words were refreshing to say the least. Blunt people always had a way of things, a truthful perspective that could either pierce or stabilize with the simple roll of a tongue. I respected that, partly because I lacked that, my own burst of individuality.

"Five-foot one is not tiny." I objected as the café began to brim, the squeals and giggles of children disrupting the indistinct atmosphere in a positive way. "Perhaps six-foot five is gigantic." His eyebrows lifted in a cute manner as his lips unconsciously jutted out into a pout.

I could see now why the airhead of a waitress practically threw herself at him not too long ago. "My height is common among most high-level athletes. See, if you would have pursued volleyball, you wouldn't find it so odd." I couldn't suppress the chuckle that left my chest, my eyes closing as I shook my head in sweetened disagreement.

I hadn't joked like that in a while. A long while. "A liberó playing at the professional level with only two years of experience? That seems awfully unfair to those that have been dedicated to volleyball for their entire life, like you, Ushijima-san." I laughed, intertwining my fingers together in hopes of gathering warmth. My hands had always been so cold, like small bundles of ice.

"Are you cold?" Ushijima was undoing the buttons of his coat, sliding it off his broad shoulders to place it on the table. He wore a grey hoodie underneath all of his heavy outerwear, the taut material persisting to prove more of his masculinity as it clung to his skin, his firm muscles much more distinct beneath the café's tawny light.

"My hands are just cold. It's probably a curse, eh?" My statement was not meant to be taken literal, but as he reached his hands out and grabbed mine, my heart snapped and the strings of my strength tore at the hand of his tactless ways.

This man, sitting in front of me, he's something else. I thought, unclasping my hands from his and wiping them down on my lap, my bottom snug between my teeth. I could still feel the lingering warmth of his hands on my skin. I couldn't focus on anything else. His touch was so foreign, yet so comforting. It frightened me. But at the same time, I missed it, even if the contact had only lasted for a few mere seconds. It felt oddly ethereal, like the breath of an angel that had barely awaken from the comforting hands of God himself.

 _Dios mio…_ "So, what made you come to this date, Luna?" I raised my head, my obsidian crystals colliding against his olive hues and my heart hastened, not used to the race of a crush.

"My friend, Chiasa, must have met with your, err, teammate beforehand. They liked each other, I suppose, and they figured that we'd like each other as well for reasons beyond us." I tucked a stray piece of hair behind my ear, folding my hands. "She mentioned that you and I were alike. Well, enlighten me then, Ushijima."

He wasn't taken aback by my request, for he simply nodded, sipping from his cup of unsweetened green tea. "Well, I barely have any free time, but when I do, I garden." He revealed.

"Garden?" I lifted an eyebrow when he hummed. "How can such a broad thing such as yourself nurse a bed of tulips that can barely fit in your hand?"

"Size does not matter, but the care that you put into caring for plants does." I don't think he was trying to object because when I boggled at his answer, he shrugged.

 _Funny. Real funny match that you got me, Chiasa…_ "And you?"

"I paint, or at least I try." I said, resting my palm under my chin, my gaze aimless as the sounds of tea kettles wailing and rushed chatter weighed over my shoulders, overwhelming my fragile state. "I'm trying to get my degree in biological sciences. Hopefully, it's a success."

"You're not so sure about that." I heard him say and my eyes met his. I could feel it. He was analyzing me. Then came the question I dreaded. "Why?" Ushijima inquired, his inquisitive eyes boring into my black pools of obscurity and I gulped, tasting the fruitiness of my chagrin.

"Well, I haven't gone to school in a long time and my history with Kanji is not so great." I admitted.

"I see. Well, why haven't you gone to school in a while? Where were you before that?" Ushijima asked and the corner of my lips curled into a grin. Wasn't he just bubbling with questions?

"I don't think we're close enough to discuss that just yet, Ushijima-san." I swirled the pad of my finger around my cup, the heat forming little droplets of water around the ceramic cup. "What about you? I shouldn't be taking up all of our sweet time explaining my lackluster life."

"What is it that you'd like to know about me?" I looked at him, charting out every inch of his skin and memorizing it briefly. He was a sight that was rare to see, and even rarer to touch. God, I wouldn't mind another touch, but I'd be testing the heavens if I dared myself any further. He felt oddly sublime, the roughness of his skin comforting and the lowness of his voice soft to the static evading my ears.

"What makes you jump out of bed every morning? What motivates you to continue on with the mundane and dreary routine that is life?" I asked, genuinely curious with what the broad and seemingly scary man before me had under his sleeve. Looks could be deceiving, after all.

The waitress came again, at the most convenient of moments, and she placed a plate of small sandwiches cut diagonally without the crust between Ushijima and I.

He didn't look up at her nor did he notice the salacious intent that colored her sleet eyes. "Well, I play volleyball. That is my life." Volleyball idiot, that what his correct definition. Volleyball idiot. I had heard that term before, a term that was used to define those that fell in love with sport and became a part of it. Not that I had ever become a Volleyball Idiot, but I had seen the process firsthand. It was always nice to see players, especially younglings, fall in love with something that would never turn back on them, at least for a while. Not immediately.

Without saying a word to his response, I swooped my hand in and mindlessly picked up a sandwich. I nibbled on the greens, my eyes widening when the shrill cry of a baby—a newborn—cut through the atmosphere, a cry leaving my lips, my past disorienting my vision and reality.

 _Babies. My past. Babies..._ His olive eyes widened and even the waitress that was too immersed with Ushijima's face stilled.

Ushijima questioned it first, surprisingly. "Is something the matter?" He looked concerned with my outbreak and everything surrounding us, even the vegetal aroma of tea that ways always tranquilizing, snaked around my shoulders, smothering my mouth and stealing my breath from my throat in an instant.

I couldn't speak, opting for my vest, resting behind the oak chair that I was sitting on, and I slung it over my shoulders, closing my eyes.

"I-I didn't mean to do that. I swear." I managed to breath out, wiggling my arms into my jean vest, and tangling my fingers in my short curls when a child screamed out in agony.

Agony, that was consuming me. The agony of my past. The stunning agony of my present. The agony of my dwindling future. It was swallowing my entire being whole, drowning my shattered essence in a pool of anguish and despair.

I opened my eyes, eyes wide and brimmed with fear, like a deer caught in headlights. "I-I can't do this…" I wasn't thinking when I said those words, Ushijima cocking his head to the side in confusion.

"You can't handle what?" I lacked an explanation, swearing when I remembered the bluish pills on the bathroom counter this morning and how I had forgotten to take them.

This was why I was being so reckless and why my past was hitting me, like a goddamn train. "I can't be here anymore. I—I've got to go." I slapped down a few yen, my vision distorted and cloudy, dotted with the suddenness of my illness that poured over my body like a cold bucket of water.

It all felt like a cold bucket of water; unforgiving and shocking.

"At least let me pay and leave your number. I'd like to meet with you more often." Ushijima countered, uncharacteristically placing his hand over mine, the contrast between our sizes vast and absolutely real.

 _What the hell do you think you're doing? You want nothing with someone like me._ "Sure. Here," I pulled out a pen from my shoulder bag, writing my number in his palm and leaving smudges of ink in his calloused skin.

 _You don't know a single thing about the hell that you intend to tangle yourself in._ He read my number, mouthing each syllable, and he nodded, giving the green light to leave as my shoulder bag swung with the ferociousness of my movements.

 _Be careful. That's what you'll need: care, lots of it_. "Bye, Ushijima-san, I didn't mean for things to go this way. I…" How else could I have explained things without exposing the reality of my situation.

The reality that I was drowning in a black pool of my thoughts and pessimism. The reality that my past was catching up with me, like the vines of an overgrown crop, they were rooting me to the ground, to face reality. The reality that although I truly was trying, it wasn't working. My disease had no ailment.

Why the hell did I even bother coming?I should have just ditched. I shook my head, blinking to regain my thought.

Wait, Chiasa would have beheaded me had I not showed up. God, why are her and my parents so adamant in snapping me out of this? This is an independent process, not anything that any one else could fix, or at least that's how it has been. "You don't have to explain yourself. Go home and relax. You look awful." I stilled, stunned by his honesty but a little touched by it as well. If I were under different circumstances, I'd be laughing right about now, but I wasn't. It felt as if I would never be under different circumstances.

But that didn't mean that I couldn't shoot back a bite as well. "Thanks, I'll jot that down for reference." I said, snickering when confusion splattered Ushijima's stoic disposition.

"You're welcome." I could hear him say as I waved out in dismissal, brushing past the café's chiming door to face the smog and ever changing lights of the city.

 _Waste, that's something I'll never miss_. I threw the edge of my scarf behind my shoulder, nuzzling my cheek against the knitted fabric.

But this—I looked over my shoulder, at the café to see the waitress already talking up a storm with Ushijima. He didn't seem interested, though, typing something indecipherable in his phone.  
 _  
RING!_ I reached inside of my shoulder bag, the curve of my warm smile reaching the corner of my round eyes.  
 _  
This I will miss greatly._ **Hi.** His text was so simply yet so endearing, like most things in this world. Simplicity conquered over all.

 **Hello…** I typed back, snapping my flip-phone back to silence as my feet thrummed to the staccato beat of my racing mind.

Socialization and people, that I miss dearly…

 **THIS IS MY FIRST TAKE AT FAN-FICTION SO BARE WITH ME. I have a lot of hope for this story, and I hope you do, too. Thanks for reading the first chapter and if you enjoyed, give me some feedback with the reviews! xD Thank you so much and have a wonderful day(or evening)~!**


	3. Dos

**Dos**  
 **  
"You've been acting odd, Luna-chan. I wonder why…"** Chiasa simpered, her sienna eyes smiling as she snapped the stem of a flower in two.

"Odd? How so?" I truthfully asked, tying the back of my forest green apron and flipping the open sign to green.

"You've been out of the house more. Socializing more. Is it because of that date that I paired you up with? Satori told me it would work, it seems like it did." She murmured, sorting out each flower by color.

I scrunched my eyebrows together in irritation, already raising my right hand to flip the too-early bird. "Such a good friend you are." I shook my head, pulling my short curls behind my head and into a bun. The glare of the morning star burned my black tresses. "And no, it isn't because of Ushijima-san. It's something else. Probably the new semester, I suppose." I threw my shoulders into a shrug, an unsatisfied scoff leaving Chiasa's small chest.

"Adding the suffix at the end of a name won't protect you, Luna-chan." She hummed, saccharine coating her soft tone. "Especially if it is for the opposite sex."

"Whatever. It's not like I want anything with him. I hope he knows that." I tucked in a piece of my bangs begin my ear, thrumming my fingers on the floor as I took inventory. "Seriously, I hope he does."

"Satori told me that he is not the smartest person when it comes to the simplest of things." Chiasa revealed without a glance in my direction. "Maybe that explains all of the buzzing from your phone over there." In unison with her words, a shrill sound emitted from my small, flip-phone.

I rushed towards it, the front door chiming along with my frantic steps.

Our conversations had fallen into a routine this past week. He'd initiate the day's conversation with a brief 'good morning' at the crack of dawn. I'd wake up, irritated but thankful for his punctualness, and then I'd continue forth with the virtual conversation, his responses curt and sometimes unsettling. He wasn't exactly the most social person in this world but, then again, neither was I. We were a work in progress, the both of us and that, oddly enough, was a comfort in itself.

"He seems like a good friend." I said, honestly, skimming his text. "I don't want to scare him away by spelling out in front of him that I don't want anything serious. I'm surprised I didn't scare him at first."

Chiasa rolled her eyes, "What did you do?"

"Nothing too bad," I assured. "I just left in the middle of our date. I… I don't know. Romance and fate, that's been uncharted territory for a quite a while now. I doubt I'll be able to take it head-on soon." I tangled my fingers in my hair, a desperate exhale heaving from my chest at the thought of it.

Friendship was already crossing the thin line surrounding me from society. But love and lust, that was exceeding the line exponentially. It'd take a year for me to face that kind of path and even longer if it branches into marriage and family.  
 _  
My idea of family is probably way different than his._ "You're such a prude, Luna-chan." Chiasa teased, nudging my elbow playfully.

But her words were far from play. "I'm not! I'm stating the truth." I defended, flailing my hands around to follow my gestures. I'd always use plenty of hand gestures, a habit that I developed back home, in Mexico.

Chiasa's thin lips curled, "The truth is that Ushijima-san is someone you don't want to miss out on. If I didn't already have a boyfriend, I'd jump on him, too. Don't let that opportunity go to waste."

I narrowed my round eyes, my bottom lip snug between my two front teeth. "What if I don't want that opportunity? What if I simply want a friend? He doesn't seem the type to have a problem with that." I countered, Chiasa bending down to feed the plants with a hose.

Water arched from the rusty hole, sprinkling over the bright leaves and stems that soared to the ceiling. "I'm just saying that perhaps in the future you _will_ want something with him and maybe that wish may not come true. Don't set yourself up for failure. Either chose one or the other, not both."

 _Either chose one not both…_ Something that lacked a name stirred within me, jostling my essence and my soul to catch the wavering attention of my mind. _Be careful with this._ My mind reminded and doubt trickled in from the darkest depths of my mind, seeping into my skin like poison. _Maybe Chiasa is right for once. You don't want to tangle yourself in a web that you know will swallow you whole, like the one in the past._

"Are you saying that I should stop talking to Ushijima-san altogether?" I questioned, pivoting my back to face Chiasa.

A thick line of red and sternness painting my lips. "I'm not saying that. I'm just telling you to be careful. No one that cares about you wants to see you dragging around another heavy weight on your shoulders. It's bad enough as it is." She said, placing the hose in the storage room and wiping away the beads of sweat that glistened over her forehead. "We don't want you to kill yourself, Luna-chan." I averted my body, my features taut with the suspicion of my own unpredictable actions.

I had not once resorted to suicide, but perhaps something as big as love and romance could incite just that. Look at Juliet and Romeo, she faked her own death and killed herself to be with him. Maybe, even if it betrayed my own dogmas, I would fall into that trap as well.

"I'll be careful." I managed to say; unsure of everything that presented itself before me. Unsure of Ushijima. Unsure of my academics which, despite my efforts, were failing to rise. Unsure of my parents who, seemed to be growing sick of me, as if I were a leech sucking out all of their needed nutrients. Unsure of my future that was dark at this moment, waiting for a light to illuminate my path and damaged hope. Unsure of my sanity that was fleeting away by the day, slowly ticking down until it reached zero and I exploded.

That's what I was, a ticking-time bomb. "What is all of this chatter that you girls are going on about? It's eight o'clock. Shouldn't people your age be grouchy this time around?" Papa's orotund voice filled the static in my ears, his eyes watching us as we organized another set of bouquets.

I'm not like most girls my age, Papa. "Shouldn't men your age be up and about this early? The early bird catches the worm, no?" Chiasa joked, my father laughing at her quip.

 _I wish I could be like that; happy and without a care in the world. I wish.._. "I'm not that old." My father resisted, his hand on my shoulder as I stayed quiet, listening to their jokes.

 _I used to be like that; sarcastic with that ever so sharp tongue of mine. What—what the hell happened to you, Luna?_ "Luna, Okāsan and I would like to invite you for dinner tonight. Care to join?"  
 _  
But when the moment presents itself before me, I am too much of a coward to grip onto it, grabbing it by the reigns in fear of it slipping from my fingers. I am too fearful of my own happiness, too scared of the loss that may come with it_. "I don't know. I have a lot to study for next month's finals. I have to pass it or else…" I lied, glad for the permanent blush that painted my cheeks.

I was never a good liar, anyway. "Are you sure? Okāsan is making agedashi dofu, your favorite."

 _It is my favorite._ "Yeah… I'll make myself a miso soup and pickled vegetables. This test is very important." I rubbed the back of my neck, the heat of my lies evading my olive skin.

"If you say so," Papa said, clearly not taking my lie as the truth. "Well, I'm going to go sort out a business arrangement with a new client. They seem to have a strong liking for our rose petals. There's coffee in the lounge room if you both want some." He cleared away and I turned back, the outline of his thin figure blurred by the heaviness of his brown jacket and layers.

Papa and I had never looked alike. While he had narrow, stormy grey eyes, mine were big and black, as black as the obsidian that lay underneath the crust of the earth in my hometown. His skin was immaculate and white, like pearls, and mine was tainted and brown, like the earth that the flowers sprouted out of.

Even our voice was different, mine accented while his was perfect. "See ya later, girls." My father wrapped a black scarf around his neck, one that I had made myself, and he left our presence as he quickly as he had come.

"Are you really going to be studying tonight, Luna-chan?" I turned to the side, Chiasa unimpressed with my cop-out.

"Don't know," I admitted, steering the balls of my feet around to head inside of the lounge. "Maybe. But right now I need coffee to awaken me from my slumber." But this disease was not a slumber, and it had no awakening.

A peachy hue poured in from the gaps in the shuttered windows, the sunset looming over the snowy horizon as a song coursed along in the background, its sweet melody inciting a hum from my quiet lips.

Chiasa had left for the day and I was left by myself to sweep up the shop, the red sign already outside as the clock struck 7. It'd take a while for me to get used to Eastern Time, and a longer while to get used to this, a new life.

 _But it all had to be done if I truly wanted to live; to breathe out one final breath_. The front door jingled, my back to the broad white window revealing the inside of the floristry and the dozens of flowers that lined up before it, waiting to be plucked.

Don't people see the red in the back of the large 'CLOSED' printed out in white? Geez... "Sorry, we're closed—"

"Luna." My fingers tightened around the wooden broom in my hands, his velvety and ever so threatening voice of his ringing the bells of recognition in my muggy mind.

 _W-Wait, what…?_ "Ushijima, what—I mean, _how_ did you find me here?" I bewildered, holding the broom protectively against my chest.

He scratched his head in confusion, the oranges from the horizon contrasting with his skin and dark olive eyes to heighten more of his beauty.

 _Oh no…_ "I didn't find you; I found that." He pointed behind me, his finger etching over the aisle of seeds.

"I see," I followed the point of his finger, hearing him make a deep sound in agreement. "Which plant do you want?"

"Moonflower," he said, my back facing him as I opened the bag of seeds, glad that he wouldn't see the ripeness of my florid face.

 _Though I wish to not have anything with him, it's hard not to admit that he is attractive—handsome, even—but I mustn't make the mistakes that I did before unless I wish to face the same predicament in my past life_. I tied the small paper bag with a green ribbon, perching it over the counter and sliding it towards him.

 _If that's the case, than I must make sure that my message is clear and upfront_. "That'll be ¥500," I carded a hand through my uneven, black locks, watching as he plopped down a few coins to pay.

I worked the cash register, his scrutiny burning through my skin and analyzing everything, like an X-ray.

 _Maybe he was an X-ray_. "Thank you," he muttered, grabbing the seeds and swiveling around to leave.

 _No one that cares about you wants to see you dragging around another heavy weight on your shoulders…_ "Ushijima, wait!" Perhaps it had been my own stupid fear that had caused me to holler back at him, forcing him to twist around to face my quivering lips.

Or perhaps it had been that I forgot all of my fears in that moment, when he looked back and met my coal eyes, and everything about the future and the past dispelled from my system. All because of that stilling moment. "I-I don't think we left off too well last time we met. I'd like to take you to dinner, my treat."

He narrowed his eyes at this, "Dinner? What exactly do you have in mind? I'm not hungry right now."

I bit my lip. Of course, fate would never bend to fit the shape of my hand. "We don't have to eat, then. Just, let me treat you. I felt a little rude and off for just barging out of there; I can't let you think of it as nothing." I ignored the rumble in my stomach. Missing a single day wouldn't cause any damage, right? Except that I'd miss a day yesterday and the day before that and so forth.

 _Shit, I'm a mess_. "We can go to the park. I heard that it's been renovated. I'd like to have a look at it."

I managed a smile, "Sure." My fingers were already untying the knot holding my green apron together. It fell loose, like the weight of my tremors. "Let me close up, though. Papa will slice me if I left even one of the clefts open." I said, digging through my pockets to pull out a mess of platinum and copper.

 _The keys_. "I'll be waiting outside." The door closed behind his tall and vacillating form, giving me enough time to regain my composure and slap some sense into drifting myself.  
 _  
Dumbass, Luna!_ I slapped my cheeks, the skin puffy and red, like a rose. _You don't want to get yourself in the web that is love, especially if it is with a man as dense and blunt like Ushijima. That'd be suicide._ I felt like smacking my forehead against the counter, repeating over and over again until I would snap myself from this never ending nightmare.

 _Like that would happen._ I twisted my fingers in my hair, exhaling slowly and inhaling deeply to ease the fire that swelled in my abdomen and chest.

 _Just relax. Just be friends with him. He won't be hurt, he might even thank you._ I finally let go of the grip on my poor hair, smoothening out the tangles that had risen and the curls that had frizzed.

 _Time to face it: the present and the eminent future._ "All done." Ushijima rose from his seat on the wooden bench that stood in front of the floristry's grand windows.

"Okay, let's go." Without a moment to spare, his long strides carried him a few feet away from my stagnant form, forcing my legs to run after him as he paced.  
 _  
Geez, he walks fast._ "Do you like nature, Ushijima?" The air was cool, not too cold nor hot. The perfect weather and the clouds looming above our ant-like bodies only added more to autumn's fresh bloom and changing colors.

"Yes, why do you ask?" He slowed his stride down a little, accommodating to fit my smaller stature.  
 _  
Remember, tell him the truth._ "Nothing. I was just wondering is all." I hid my hands in the pockets of my pea coat, whistling and straying off to elsewhere.

He didn't even look back when I said that. "I see," he murmured. "I've always liked it, it's better than Tokyo."

 _Tokyo?_ "Did you use to live in Tokyo before or what?" I questioned, barely meeting the slow stride of his tennis shoes. Looking at it now, Ushijima didn't dress as nicely as most of the men in the block. Sure, he dressed okay, but it was a matter of comfort for him that ranged from mostly under-armor, sweaters, hoodies, tennis shoes, and jeans. He didn't seem to care about anything it seemed since his blank face stated it all, raw and open for the world to see.

 _If only a woman's life could be that easy, especially mine._ "I still live there. I've been staying in Miyagi for the past couple of months, though, for volleyball training. I've been staying with my mother for now, she doesn't live too far from here." He explained.

I closed my eyes, my lashes heavy over my cheeks _. Mama… Mama… Mama…_ An ache sprang in my chest.

"Come on, you're walking too slowly." Ushijima said, easily surpassing my steps and reaching the final crosswalk, pressing the pedestrian button.

I bit the inside of my cheek. _Snap out of it, Luna. Open your eyes. You don't want to become something else, another statistic, you want to be happy, not miserable for your entire life.  
_  
 _Yes; happy._ "Okay, okay," I hurried, throwing the edge of my knitted scarf over my shoulder. "I forgot to ask you but why exactly would you be planting moonflowers in March? That isn't the correct plan."

"I'm not," a white light flared, showing the digitalized body of a person walking. "I'm keeping them; I hope to plant them before I leave."

"Make sure it's when summer begins," I reminded, the late frost of spring still fresh in the evening air. "You don't want your poor babies to freeze in the middle of the night."

"I can take care of plants by myself, Luna." Ushijima stated, both of our distanced bodies already reaching the cobblestone pathways and icy grass of the park.

No child was in sight and I was thankful for that. "Okay, well, I was just reminding you." We entered the evergreen mess of the trees, a few lights illuminating our way. "I haven't been to a park for a while," I admitted, closely trailing after his tall body for leverage in case I managed to lose myself within the greens.

 _Get lost_ ; God, I was already lost, lost in the maze that was my puzzling mind.

"Don't worry, I used to come here as a kid. I know the older parts by memory." Ushijima assured, easing his pace to match mine.

My eyes widened and had the azure skies hid my blush, my cheeks would have been red, red like the blood that coursed through my veins.

 _So polite, not like other men._ "You don't have to slow down; I can keep up for myself." I said, quickening the pace of my steps. He would choose whether we'd stay together from the raise and sweep of his heavy steps.

"But you're lost, you said it yourself." His brown tresses glared underneath the lights from the center of the park that became more and more evident. "Anyway, you might not understand the directions if you lose sight of me. They're in Kanji."

"Oi, that's rude of you to say." My eyebrow lifted, hostility embellishing my fiery words. Who the hell did he think he was?

"What?" Ushijima sounded genuinely confused and I bit the corner of my lip. Maybe he was as dense as Chiasa and his friend made him out to be. "The last time we met, you pronounced some of the words incorrectly. I didn't say anything because it was our first encounter, but now that we're a lot closer, it's harder for me to hold back. I didn't mean to offend you in any way." He answered truthfully, the sounds of running water and gentle strings moved along by a bow lulling before us, nearly erasing all of the animosity and agony in my chest and replacing it with bliss.

Nearly. "I suppose its fine. You aren't the only one that has brought that to my attention." When I first came to Japan, Chiasa was my mentor, both in floristry and Japanese. I had learned Japanese since a young age, but speaking mostly Spanish throughout my life wiped it away from my hard drive, replacing it with a new memo of life and routine.

Chiasa would always make fun of my accent, and she still does today. "But damn, you are one blunt individual." We reached the edge of the cobblestone plaza, his steps no longer slowing to meet mine; that had offered some sort of unexplained comfort in this cryptic atmosphere. Security. It had offered security in this black world of only a few dim stars illuminating the abyss of ambiguity.

 _Don't cling onto him. Just be friends with him_. "I'm sorry," Ushijima apologized and as I finally reached his pace and turned to the side to see him, his olivine eyes sparkled, turning tawny from the white lights around us and dazzling from the stars above us.

 _Ay dios mío._ "Don't be," I raised my scarf, wrapping it around my neck and mouth to heat my skin and hide my blush. I could easily blame the cold for my stuttering, saying it was my chattering teeth, not my growing shyness. "We don't ask to be somebody else, we simply become who we are and we must accept that. We can't change ourselves, Ushijima-san."

"Stop calling me that," he was the first to turn away, moving his hands in his pockets. He inched closer to the fountain in the middle of the trees and the pavement, eyeing the small chunks of ice that had formed from this morning. "We're more than acquaintances, add a –Kun instead if you wish."

 _If I do, I might as well start calling you Wakatoshi, then._ "-Kun? Are you sure? We've barely been talking for a few days." I traced the sleeve of my coat, the wool of the material rough under my touch.

 _Yeah, and you already seem to be taking a great hit in the gut for him, too, when you shouldn't. Not after everything that has happened_. "If I didn't like you, I wouldn't talk to you. I'd throw your number away and talk to whichever girl yearned for my attention." I gulped. Now this time it would be way more difficult to explain the pinkness that was staining the tip of my ears and the entirety of my olive skin.  
 _  
Still, he's too arrogant. Or maybe that is his bluntness? I can't figure him out and if I don't sooner than later, I might run away from this situation or freeze in the amber hue of his eyes._ "Okay, Ushijima-kun," I emphasized the suffix, the security that came from the slight distance dissolving and becoming a part of the frilly, little flakes of snow that melted in the atmosphere.

This was inevitable now. "Food, you mentioned that you wanted some food, no?"

"Not really, it's fine. I can eat when I get home—"My sentence was cut short because in a swift instant the saccharine scent of vanilla and caramel slapped my cheeks, accompanied by the comforting wafts of freshly baked dough anko.

Taiyaki? "Do you like taiyaki?" Ushijima asked, noticing the blowing of my black irises and the goosebumps rising over my taut skin, hunger glazing over my already sparkling eyes.

My cheeks were bathed in red, my hands flying upwards to smack my florid skin, rubbing softly to ease the redness and the sting of my small hands.

"Doesn't everybody?" I responded with a question, Ushijima's eyebrows knitting downwards, not satisfied with my answer.  
 _  
I'm only acting like this to protect myself, Ushijima-san._ "I suppose. When I was a kid, my father used to always buy me taiyaki when we went out. My mother stopped once they divorced, though; she didn't want me to gain any unnecessary weight." He said, trotting forwards, his large hands already playing with the metallic rounds that were in his pockets as he neared the taiyaki cart wordlessly. He didn't bother showing his face and I thinned my lips, following after him.  
 _  
I guess I'm not the only one with a hidden past, huh?_ I had always been perceptive. _Fisgona_ , that's what most people called it: nosy.

Best tell him that you're only friends, nothing else. We reached the small cart and a line of only a few people, adults, waited in front of us. I was confused. There should be children, it was the middle of March for God's sake. This was their niche, after all; the Mecca of their sole existence.

It is a bit late, can't be later than seven-thirty. "Which flavor do you want?"

I opened my mouth in protest, "You don't have to buy me anything. I can pay for myself—"

"I didn't ask for your output. If I offered to pay, I will pay." He cut, his face as taciturn as ever and even more so under the darkening sky.

I could make out the slight quirks in him under this light, disregarding the algidity that he exerted and replacing it with openness, the openness that only experience granted. His face was softer, a lot less sharp and youthful under the fading orange of the day, as if the moon worked in his favor. He had this particular scent, too; smelling of pinecones and soap, like the first snow. Perhaps Ushijima represented many things that resembled a beginning. Why would he have anything to do with the beginning?

 _He looks even more handsome, too, if that's even possible_. "Okay," I glanced to the side, moving away from the scrutiny that his narrow, olive eyes radiated. He reminded me of an eagle; gallant and intimating. "I'd like vanilla, please."

He didn't say anything in response and I sighed in relief, the air of my breath freezing in the atmosphere.

"One taiyaki for the girl with pretty, black eyes." The man making the taiyaki smiled and I tightened the hold of my scarf around my neck instinctively. My eyes were perhaps the most conspicuous feature about me. Holding the biggest difference between me and other Japanese people, they were round and black like the crystals that shined beneath the soil, relishing in the obscurity of life.

 _Even I can empathize with that, the onyx crystals._ "Thank you," I took the fish-shaped treat from the old man's hands, his beady eyes wavering elsewhere.

"My pleasure." He didn't seem too satisfied, thinking as Ushijima and I strolled along, the blowing momo petals catching my attention.

I wonder what that was all about… "Momo petals already blooming this early around is not normal." He noted, carefully eyeing their flowery drift.

A single petal fell on the floor, right atop of his left foot. "Spring must be inching in. That means that the moonflowers will bloom sooner than later." Though it was easy to not notice the shift in his colorless words, the faint glimmer in his eyes, the passion, it ignited and it burned everything surrounding him, including my heart and body.

 _Shit_. "Moonflowers are pretty flowers, but they only grow at night if that is your calling." I bit into one of the fins first, covering my mouth when the excess cream dared to slither out of my mouth.

"I love the night, especially where days like this. Days that spring is so close that you can practically rip it out from the sky, like a flower." Ushijima uttered, my shoes catching my attention. I needed to pour out the news now.

"Ushijima-san, I mean, kun!" He turned around, effortlessly scaring the life out of my pores.

I turned away from his impenetrable gaze, unconsciously biting down on the taiyaki only to chew on the head of the red snapper, a creek of sugar stained my rosy lips.

I cursed, taking off my scarf and stuffing it inside of my shoulder bag, grabbing a handful of tissues from my bag and slathering over my sticky face.

Ushijima looked concerned, well, as concern as he could have mustered. "You eat carelessly." There it was, his bluntness. Yet then, he grabbed a single napkin, cleaning my face from any dripping vanilla.

I wanted to scream, really. I hated relying on others, especially those that unknowingly held a significant role in my life, like Ushijima.

I raised my hand, placing it over his and plucking the napkin from him, easing it into the waste bin.

 _Now's the time. Now's the time._ I turned, my heels hovering over tiny particles of ice as our eyes met, his unresponsive while mine held a mystery of stars inside of them.

"I don't think that we should be anything other than acquaintances." I shocked myself, saying it without a stutter or stammer or even a glide of my watery mouth. My fingers wrapped around the warm bread in my hands, Ushijima's eyes cold and blank.

"You don't to become friends, Luna?" Friends? I hadn't thought of that. Not once in this dreary life of mine had I viewed the opposite sex as a friend. Not once.

 _Change, that's what is drifting these petals in the air._ Change _._ "I-I don't know. Truthfully, even I don't know if I want to do anything anymore. Anything at all." I admitted, the taiyaki in my hand bland to my senses as reflection overcame them, like a tsunami of raw emotion.

 _Stop being so careless. Pull the splinter right out of your heart and get it over with._ "I thought that we were already friends."

That's all it took. A simple comment from the most perplexing yet simple man on this planet, that's all it took for me to shut my eyes and stop, stop trying to distance myself from the pain.

"I-I don't… I don't know." I was truly pathetic, giving answers to a man that could have easily been happily married by now with a child on the way. A man that could have promised so much had I not been such a coward. Oh, how troublesome my fears were, so evil and unforgiving to the present and the future.

"I want to be friends with you." My lip quivered. My fists curling and releasing to sync in with my unsteady breaths. I breathed calmly after a while, when the flower drift welcomed my short curls and flustered face.

"Let's be friends, then." I said, clearly out of the blue, my eyes matching the vastness of the night sky draping behind us; black and full of cryptic beauty.

"Okay." Ushijima was so simple, walking towards the violinist to listen; he thrummed his left fingers when he did.

 _Perhaps this is not only the beginning of spring, but also of something else, be it moonflowers or the entirety of the spring year; something was birthed this year, something unbeknownst to my oblivious self.  
_  
The gentle melody of the violist lulled the small crowd of adults and teens to a silence, the chimes from the taiyaki man's cart the only other sound accompanying the wonder that the young musician synthesized from her fingertips alone.

 _Perhaps this is the beginning of us, our blossoming friendship, and maybe more._ _Maybe_. I saw Ushijima, his face full of youth and softness once again.

I smiled, not caring about the doubt that unhinged the clefts holding my mind together or of the panic that dared to paralyze my body.

I closed my eyes, the weight of my past lessening, and I faced the stars; knowing that as each new day passed, it would be different now, much more different.

 _Maybe because of you._ Maybe because of you _._ The crowd clapped when the composer finished her piece, dispersing along with the momo petals in the wind.

But Ushijima did not wait, as if he knew that I was thinking, _reflecting_ on my present, past, and future, and in that fleeting moment of trust and acceptance; I opened my eyes, fully aware that he was different and that he would be the only one to accept me in this cruel world of mine.

 **Oml, you guys. I didn't upload the prologue because I am dumb, so I'm going to upload it later. ;-; Besides that, I hope you all are enjoying this story because if you are please send me some feedback. If you think that her depression is excessive, I won't give you any hints but the reasons behind it are severe. Very severe. So yea, I hope you all enjoyed this chapter and leave some feedback if you wish! Thanks~!**


	4. Tres

**Tres**

 **"Oi, you've been staring at that pot for the past hour or so. Do you intend on buying it?"**

Ushijima turned, his olivine eyes meeting mine while the icy flakes of winter's final bite gnawed in, accompanied with the flowery tang of spring.

It was an ever changing period of time, when winter shifted to spring and the plants awoke from their slumber to quake the earth and grow colorful petals along their thin, brown arms.

Ushijima ran a hand under his sharp jaw, most likely thinking, it was difficult to properly appraise the emotions that he withheld. He was like a crystal ball, anyone could see it and interpret it to their desire, but the truth that swirled within it was unbeknownst to the eyes of the beholder.

"I suppose. It's a good fit, after all. It could fit the majority of my small flowers in my balcony." He recalled, eyeing the price tag with tentative eyes. "I like the style as well; messy and colorful with haphazard strokes. I like that." He reached his index finger, tracing the dried drips of brown paint that were glued onto the ceramic material, pressing hard enough to smudge copper on his tan skin.

I hummed, my mind galaxies away as the edge of a new semester—a new year—soared above my idle self, already ready to swallow my body as a whole, tarnishing my olive skin with the welts of my growing fears and doubts.  
 _  
Leave it all behind. Leave. It. All. Behind_. I exhaled, a spritz of a tulip's breath tickling my nostrils and eliciting a sneeze from my nose.

Ushijima pivoted his back slightly, to the left, and he faced me, as if he were waiting for my approval.

Why would he need my approval when it came to simplistic decisions such as this? "Take it, if you want. If not, leave it. Don't just buy it to accumulate dust and break. That'd be fruitless and cruel to any flower dying to have a home." I muttered, biting the inside of my cheek when I repeated the sentence in my mind.

Perhaps I am that flower dying for a home? Dying for the acceptance of the flowers and soil surrounding my shriveling body. Perhaps I am everything that I had dreaded to be. Whether it be a florist, a student, or even a bloody maniac; I dread it all, every last drip of my putrid life that was sour to the very brim of my existence.

"I am still taking it. They might not have it in stock when I come back next month." Ushijima came to a conclusion, effortlessly hoisting the heavy planting pot with his arms embedded with years of volleyball training and labor.

"Yeah, they'd never wait that long." I reminded, trailing after him like a siren, silently hoping to grasp onto the life that he effortlessly radiated. I needed that spur of life, that spur that lightened every inch of my life, whether it be the past, present, or the unpredictable future. "But it's a bargain. A cheap price for a cheap pot. I'd buy it, too, if I had the money." I whisked, Ushijima sweeping his gaze over his shoulder to acknowledge my useless banter.

"I can give it to you if you want." I stilled, my rosy lips thinning to mirror the string of permanent crimson that stained my cheeks. I'd always have red cheeks, since I was a baby, and I was glad that Ushijima hadn't pointed it out just yet, unlike the rest of the people in this strictly uniformed country. Maybe he saw it as something innovative, something that betrayed the xenophobia that had plagued the land of the rising sun for years on end. It didn't matter, it made blushing much easier to question, and for that I was glad.

"I have too many pots in my apartment. My parent's think that my backyard is the perfect place to hoard all of their half-broken and horribly painted pots and vases." The edge of my fingernail scraped the skin of my cheek, my mind a mile ahead of everything as the cashier proceeded to check out the plot, my eyes glued to the reddish-brown color. "Anyway, I wouldn't have enough time to plant anymore flowers with the coming semester. It's my final one before I graduate."

"I thought you said that you barely started working on your degree." The cashier rolled in a wagon that lay beside the register, placing the pot atop of the dusty metal.

"I already had my degree back in Mexico." I explained, the old lady handling the cash register sighing out a smile. "The thing is that here, in another country, they don't transfer the credits. So, I had to do my basics all over again. What a bore, huh?" I hid the bite in my tone, exhaling when a single dust of ice speckled over my cheeks, right next to my beauty mark.

A beauty mark was splattered beneath the curve of my lashes and round eyes, glimmering in all of its foreign and unprecedented glory, like a messy masterpiece.

I'm a messy masterpiece. "If you find solace in what you're doing, then it will never be boring." Ushijima said, dragging the cart behind him while the old woman from the cash register leaned over the countertop, watching us to make sure we wouldn't take her screeching cart. "I'll never be bored of volleyball, it's a part of me, like the blood that courses through my veins, and the passion has already immersed itself with my essence."

I took my bottom lip in between my teeth, my nose scrunching. "You see, I don't have that—passion—I lack a great deal of that." I drawled, "Maybe that's why my life is utter shit." I shook off the excess snow that had piled on the rear end of Ushijima small car, eyes planted on the glare that my black boots emanated.

"You're bothered," Ushijima stated, already listing off an index that correctly described my mood at the moment. "That's why you cursed. You sound so ugly when you do."

"That's the point of cursing." I said, sliding my small and shivering hands in my pockets as we returned the cart. "To relieve yourself of everything bad, ugly, and vulgar. That's the premise behind cursing, and it's a good stress reliever, too."

"There are plenty of other ways to relieve stress." He countered, handing the old woman back the handle to her cart and trailing back to the car, where I leaned my back against the icy windshield. "If you weren't such a pessimist, you would find them."

"Okay, _Dad_ ," rolling my eyes, I crossed my arms over my chest and wiggled inside of the car, the sleekness of the leather rubbing against the matrix of my olive skin and rising a valley of goosebumps over my flesh.

"I'm not your father, Luna."

I couldn't breathe. My cheeks and lips puckered out, like a blowfish, as I slapped my cold hands against my tepid skin, a futile attempt to ease the chortles that poured out of my raspy mouth.

Was this guy serious? "Oh my god…" My cheeks were as ripe as a slice of fresh meat, dripping with strings of pink chagrin and forgotten timidness. "You have to be joking. You _better_ _be_ joking."

Ushijima stabbed the car into ignition, his face colored with the grey hue of confusion. "I'm not. What is there to joke about?"

I lost my mind.

By the time the howls and snorts of laughter ceased, my chest trembled from the force of my giggles, the strain of my smile, and the clench of my jaw that held it all together, like the glue that seemed to dissolve into the ivory hue of my brittle bones.

 _It's good to laugh. I haven't laughed like this in what, a year and a half? This goddamn disease of mine._ "You're salivating, Luna." Ushijima pointed out, figuring that if he couldn't pinpoint my offense, he might as well point out silliness of my actions. My reckless and childish actions. Oh, how I hadn't been childish in a long time.

"Sorry," quickly, I wiped the excess drool from the corner of my mouth, grimacing at the string of clarity. "I'm sorry, it's just… I've never met someone like you. Someone so innocent yet so scary-looking. I'm intrigued, really. You're a head-snapping kind of person, Ushijima-kun."

"Thank you, Luna." Was all he said, the heater barely warming up to defrost the thin, frosty parties that were my hands.

I rested my palm under my chin as we drove across the wet, black asphalt.

A group of children played around in yesterday's snow, giggling and smiling when one of them—the shortest one—slipped and skated over the icy sidewalk. They all laughed, but their eyes softened when a stream of tears ran down the small child's cherub face.

 _That's me: the hopeless one._ "What's the address?"

"You turn to the street to the left and it's I have to insert a street. It's in the countryside so we should be nearby." I said, my eyes moving away from the impish activities that the children partook in and to the road that stood before me that was black and boring.

Like my life. "I see," Ushijima said and I hummed, fiddling with my slender fingers.

He raised the volume up and a fruity melody of music flooded our ears, my feet subconsciously tapping along with the ornate rhythm that the violin and cello exuded.

I always had a thing for classical music. "Sorry for the inconvenience today. I don't have a car and I forgot my rail card at the shop." I began, the edge of my fingers folding the thin papers that were sewed into the spine of the textbook in my hand. _An Introduction to Biology_ plastered in big, black font in front of the 900-page textbook. "And walking wasn't an option. I should have just locked myself in my freezer if I did."

I can never do anything by myself. "You're not an inconvenience." Ushijima said and stayed silent from the on. The car bumped, the asphalt jeered by last night's frost and years of abuse. I bit my lip; nobody would ever care about the streets or the towns that lacked a name, like me.

 _Inútil._ The scarf around my neck—one that was maroon colored and had been knitted from my own shaky hands—suddenly felt tight. Like the day of my first date in this country. Like the day that I found out about my big secret. Like the day—like the day that my entire life changed. It all felt suffocating, paralyzingly, and absolutely toxic.

This was it. These were the effects of my disease. "I hope that the—"Ushijima couldn't finish his sentence, for another car zipped right in from the left, like a boxer shooting an uppercut, and nearly hit us.

My heart flopped back and forth, trying to regain semblance, as I opened my mouth, releasing soft and short breaths that became ice in the thin air. My skin felt like it was peeling; the intensity of the other driver's velocity leaving me in a quivering state of mind, one where my legs were shaky and my entire body was uneven. It was a knockout, straight to my sensitive heart.

"Sorry! Didn't see you there!" The other driver waved, sweat-dropping when they noticed the shame that Ushijima directed with his eyes alone.

"Be careful. You could have hit us." My eyes were screwed shut and for the second time in my life I felt like a bird; frightened to the point that my heart may burst. I had heard once that birds were so fragile that they could explode and that's exactly how I felt; glassy and volatile and gripping onto the ripping strands of my sanity.

 _Not again…_ I'm sure that my cheeks challenged the hue that the leaves were starting to shed, my fingers shaky and my skin welting. I had once gone through hell and back, three years ago, and now here I was, tasting the sweltering heat of the Devil's smile on my tongue, my chest and mind a minefield that was waiting to explode. That's what I was—a battle between life and death—with both sides losing terribly and my body quaking at the time-stilling revelation that struck a chord of chaos within me. I was the collateral damage.

I opened my eyes, my vision distorted and static filling my ears until I heard my predicament.

"She didn't make it." I opened my eyes once again, hoping that this was all a nightmare and sighing out in relief when the icy road greeted my sore eyes.

 _Fucking flashbacks…_ "Why did you rent all of these textbooks when you've covered most of the material already?" Ushijima asked with a voice as deep as the seas miles away and as velvety as the buds that swirled inside of a rose.

I cleared my throat, glad that neither my tongue nor my throat was lost in the terrifying ordeal. Only my sanity was diminished, but that was no surprise.

"I learned my material in Spanish, not Japanese. I want to become a biology teacher someday, Ushijima. I have to be an expert at everything that I teach." I said, the weight of the three textbooks in my lap heavy and unsettling.

Half of my statement was true. It was true, the fact that I did wanted to pursue biology, but not as a teacher. However, when the locusts of time and misfortune came and devoured the grains of my golden hope, the idea dissolved in the midst of the famine and before I knew it, it had starved my striving potential and drive. That's what it has taken—my hope—and, despite of everyone else's praises, my dreams seemed light years away; vanishing in the nothingness that was the sky.

He steered the car elsewhere, a kilometer dividing my anxious self with my home, my safeguard. "You look shaken up. What's wrong?" Ushijima inquired, eyes not straying from the road.

He was like a robot, never failing and never expressing the world that swirled within him. He was too perfect. "N-Nothing. It's just… it's been awhile since I've been in such close proximity with death before. A short yet long while." I admitted, my mind tracing the brief altercation that the car before us presented not too long ago.

It mirrored the same altercation that I had experienced three years ago, but the results were different and a lot less murky than the present. "Don't exaggerate. We weren't close to death at all." Ushijima said, his calloused hands molding with the steering wheel as we drove over slippery streets.

"Maybe," I said aloud, my thoughts pouring out from my mind and mouth garrulously, like music. "Maybe I am exaggerating, but it sure as hell felt like it."

"To you but not to me," he stated, already parked in front of my cozy, one-bedroom-and-bathroom flat.

 _Okasan's old house._ His eyes shifted from the keys in my hands and the cold breaths that left my lips, the lingering scent of melon pan from earlier riddling my breath. "Don't immerse yourself in doltish thought. It was nice spending time with you."

"Likewise," I opened the car door, slipping away from the warmth of his small car and raising my hand to wave. "Don't lose your tongue while you're at it."

"My tongue is right here and while I'm at what?" My lips pursed, my cheeks red and hot from the depression of my amusement and infancy.

God, he was so unintentionally funny. "Nothing. Nothing at all." I dismissed, turning my back to open my front door. "And yeah-yeah, see you later, too, Ushijima!"

I opened the door to my empty living room, the hardwood floor creaking under my touch and the house caving into my presence, like a parasite.

It was black, pitch to be precise, and the shutters were strewn shut. The waft of cotton balls was in the air as I traipsed around a nest of old magazines, swearing when a glob of paint splattered under my black boots.

Stagnation, an effect of my crippling depression and a pain-in-the-ass whenever someone was simply trying to get to bed. Maybe that was the point of it, to not let me in bed and reflect over my sorrows. Maybe it all had a purpose.

 _Sure, keep on thinking that and you may become a poet._ Alas, my body tumbled across the bedroom, resting over the homemade canvass of my handmade quilt.

My fingers curled. I had made this before I left home, before everything had gone to hell, and the scent was still there, the scent of cheap perfume. My mother's perfume.

 _Fuck_. I lifted my head, my short black hair a mess over the feather pillows, and the pitter-patter of rain eased the spinning in my head.

 _Not again_. I opened my eyes, my irises blow wide when a figure appeared before me.

Her hair was black, like mine, and her skin was dark, like mine, and her eyes were closed, like mine had been, and she wore this dress. This beige, tunic dress that had ancient stitching and history. This dress that had belonged to the earth, but now belonged to the rich ores of wealth. This dress that reflected all of my blood and history. This dress that my mother wore, and she swore I would wear as well. A dress that highlighted my link, my link with the other world that I was so earnestly trying to forget.

 _You can never escape your past, it will always come. Always._ The figured cupped my face with hands as cold as steel and before I knew it, she was smothering my face with her presence, her toxic presence.

 _The truth can never be revoked. It will always rise, like the sun, a reminder._ My breath had been wrongfully stolen, displaced from my chest and leaving my entire body feeling hollow, missing the life that had once embraced my being.  
 _  
Is this… could this possibly be it?_ I gagged, hopeless and helpless to the woman before me that looked so similar to me, to my mother.

 _Could she be the one that is holding me back?_ The rosary around my neck snapped, the woman opening her eyes to reveal darkness. The darkness of my sickness. Of my disease.

 _Why—why now?_ I gasped, panting for breath and sweating profusely when I woke up from my nightmare.

I tossed around my bed, checking the time to see that it was no later than 19:00.

My eyes were red and hot, like jewels made out of pure magma, and I let the tears of my frustration run down, hoping that it would ease the fire that brewed inside of my ribcage.

I must have drank a bottle of gasoline, or so it felt, because when I raised myself even a small inch, my body dropped like lead.

 _C'mon, don't do this now._ I edged my hips to the left, stilling when a lurch of nausea struck my stomach.

 _Do I have a fever?_ The doorbell rang and I cursed, placing a hand on my forehead and biting my lip. Now, how the hell was I going to get out of this damned bed?

 _I could always yell, but it's not like yelling ever gained any benefit._ Knocks shook the front door, the tin roof rustling from the wind and the rain. I sighed, perking up at the sound of a voice, an angelic and motherly voice.

"Luna-chan, are you home? Luna-chan?" Okāsan's voice sang, the knocks of her hand following after and the thought of ringing the doorbell well forgotten.

"I'm home!" I managed out, surprisingly myself when I gained enough strength in my wobbly legs to stand and move. "I-I'm on my way!"

"Okay." I turned the lights on to the living room, night cascading into the house and enhancing the ominous aura that everything emitted.

I opened the door and Okāsan's lithe and sweet self was already crouching down to tend to the bed of red tsubakis that lined the stoop. Her long, black hair was pulled back, as it always was, into a low bun that contrasted with her ivory skin. Her eyes were wrinkled as she smiled, "You've been taking real good care of them. I'm surprised, your father said that he'd expect you not to."

"My father is old and cranky." I shook my head, the frigidness of the early spring air touching my cheeks softly, like the breath of a fallen angel. "He thinks that I can't handle a few plants all by myself? Well, he'll be damned."

"Surely," Okāsan stood from her spot, her body sprouting from the ground to reveal the basket of food beside her left leg. "I didn't mean to intrude on you, Luna-chan—"

"That's exactly why you came: to intrude." I spun, sashaying back inside of the house, forgetting to close the door.

"Luna-chan, please," Okāsan pleaded, closing the door behind her and lagging behind me as I set myself down on the couch, bringing a pillow to my ears. "Please… this isn't healthy. How long ago has it been since you've eaten?"

"And how does that concern you?" I snapped, throwing the plush to the hardwood floor and facing her, my eyes as sharp as obsidian. "You're not even my mother."

That visibly hit Okāsan. Hard. Her pretty, black eyes becoming clear with tears, tears that I had created while the deep lines stretching her milky skin softened. "T-That's not the point! We care—both your father and I—we won't let you live like this anymore."

I rolled my eyes, "Do you think I asked to be this way? Do you think I asked for this shit that composes just about every bit of my life? No, of course not, but we never ask for anything in this world. So, when you or Papa waltz right into my life and try to instill order into something that even I don't understand, how do you expect me to react? Not positively, that's for sure."

Okāsan couldn't hold her tongue together to form a sentence, her mouth quivering and her jaw shaky. "Y-Your father and I, we signed you up, for a support group."

That was it. That was the fire that ignited the explosion within me. "What!" A clamor of rage, unsettlement, and resentment rattled my chest. My chest was scorching, fueled and brimmed with the reiterating sting of my frustration. My frustration that left me so helpless, helpless to the pain and suffering that my disease imposed on me. I was so helpless to it all, the breaking of walls and pillars surrounding my frantic body. I was so helpless to madness. "You have no right! I—I hate you…! Who the hell do you think you are! You don't know anything about me!"

"Luna-chan, listen to yourself! You… you are just being mean. Where you ever mean back then?"

"Fuck you!" I raced out of the living room, heading for the bathroom, and slamming the door behind my body, biting my lip when the knocks pounded against the oak surface.

"Neither you nor anybody else knows a damn thing about me!" I yelled, enclosing myself in a ball, a tight ball of my regret.

"Luna-chan, please, just open the door and let me help you." Okāsan begged and my head wobbled, my skin dry and vulnerable to the coldness of the tiles beneath my legs.

"No… You think that this is something that I can switch off at will. No, _this isn't_ a joke. This isn't something that I can control; this is independent. It grows inside of me, clawing and gnawing at my flesh and sanity, and I know that it will burst, and when it does; I won't be saved. _Everyone_ thinks that this is irreversible." My tongue split in half, the past and the present converging and obliterating my identity, an identity that was tarnished by the slashes of society and popular opinion. " _Pero no tiene remedio_ : this has no remedy."

My hands found themselves grappling onto the cold, white edges of the toilet. Bile sifted the contents in my stomach back and forth, a gag already warning me of the lurch that my own turmoil brought.

I wiped my forehead, beads of sweat seeping into the lines of my palm. My black hair stuck to my tacky skin and as Okāsan's knocking slowly went away in my rippling mind, so did the anger that had consumed my entire essence and soul, sorrow replacing it all and leaving my body feeling numb; in need of a prayer to fix it all.

 _Dios, ayúdame._ "I'm going to find the key!" Okāsan announced, done with my childish actions and already miles away.

 _Everyone was always miles away._ My body carved a path for itself. My hand,raising the sleeve of my sweater to reveal the delicious skin of my forearm, opened the cupboard. A shiny razor lay within the wooden arms of the counter, beckoning the hurt and suffered..

 _No one knows. No one knows a thing about me._ I sliced it across my scarred skin, small droplets of red hitting against the tiled floor along with the tears that had unconsciously welled in my eyes and watered the thorns that scraped away at everything inside of me.

 _I am so alone._ The door flew open, Okāsan throwing my body to the floor, the razor out of my hands and across the tiles.

Blood forced it to glare, to remind us all of everything that it brought, and everything that compelled it to exist. "Luna-chan, please…" Okāsan sobbed, her tears hot and heavy and wetting the fabric of my sweater.

Her voice lost its gentleness, panic evading her vocal chords and manipulating them, manipulating them to bend to the yield of my hand.

 _Such a nuisance you are, making those that love you cry and suffer all because of your own petty thoughts. You are simply a magnet, a magnet of misery._ "W-Why?" I asked myself, Okāsan's thin arms tightening around me as all of my sanity dispelled itself from my trembling body. "Why me?"

She didn't say anything, holding me and breathing, breathing out a prayer that was the only familiar thing to me in this country.

"W-W-Why?" I hadn't realized it then, but I was screaming. Imploring. Begging the world to give me an explanation for the breaking of my insides and soul.

"Why…?" It was painful to break a bone, but it was not as painful as breaking a soul. A bone could heal, the heart could not. It could only hope and shrivel, like a dying flower.

Okāsan's breath muffled the weeping that escaped both of our mouths, the pitter-pattern of the rain stilling to fall in tandem with our cries and tears.

I bit my lip, tasting the bitter and broken remains of my shattered sanity.

 **I HAVEN'T UPDATED FOR SHIT BUT IT IS BC I LITERALLY HAVE BEEN SO BUSY. RIP ME.**

 **HOPE YOU GUYS LIKED THE CHAPTER! BTW, I'M IN THE PROCESS OF REWRITING THE STORY SO THESE DRAFTS MAY NEED TO BE BRUSHED UP. NEVERTHELESS, THANK YOU ALL FOR TAKING THE TIME OUT OF YOUR DAY TO READ AND HAVE A WONDERFUL WEEK! 3**


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